Driver

Less is more: a superb existential thriller to rival Point Blank and car chases to equal The French Connection, along with a couple of outstanding performances from the leads.

Here, the underworld's most talented getaway driver (O'Neal) is obsessively pursued by a corrupt, power-mad cop (Dern), who'll stop at nothing to catch him - even if it means blackmailing a seedy gang of bank robbers to help lure him into a trap. Aiding The Driver (these are characters who don't need names) is the beautiful and enigmatic Player (Adjani), who helps double-cross The Detective.

Walter Hill once mused that all his movies, like those of fellow director John Carpenter, were really westerns in disguise; hence the cowboy hats, Winchester rifles and, er, cowboys in the case of The Long Riders - which crop up repeatedly in his pictures. (Although where that leaves Brewster's Millions is anybody's guess.) The Driver, originally devised as a vehicle for Steve McQueen, is no exception: if O'Neal's country music-loving driver is referred to as 'The Cowboy', Dern, who once received death threats for killing John Wayne on screen, plays his twitching, preening nemesis like every crooked sheriff from Rio Lobo to Unforgiven.

Everybody is A Man (or Woman) With No Name - archetypes defined by their roles ('The Player', 'The Connection'), existing purely to drive the plot forward. O'Neal plays the eponymous anti-hero as half-man, half-automobile, speaking only when absolutely necessary - "Get in", "Go home" - expending just the right amount of energy to get the job done, as evinced by three of the most incredible car chases in cinema. (Hill's previous work as assistant director on Bullitt obviously stood him in good stead here).

As with Jim Jarmusch's Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, or Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samourai, which The Driver most resembles, nothing is wasted. "How do we know you're that good?" asks a doubtful crime baron, on procuring The Driver's services. O'Neal's unspoken reply providing rare light relief, as with casual insouciance and surgical precision, he reduces the dismayed owner's Mercedes to jigsaw pieces against an underground car park's concrete pillars to display his credentials.

Like a manic mechanic, Hill similarly strips the story - part-action thriller, part-existential noir - back to its essence, siphoning off dialogue, back story, character development and love interest, until only the Zen flesh and bones remain.

As many other Walter Hill films, The Driver portraits a stripped universe inhabited by archetypes. These are nameless, speechless and can trace their roots to the principles of Epic.

It can happen in any city, during the late 70s or nowadays but as a film noir in its essence, exclusively at night.

The performances are great and the car chases register no equal in film history. The pace of the delivery of lines is almost as suspensful as the story itself.

The minimalism of Hill's execution resembles the cinema of Jean Pierre Melville and the film's universe picks up there where Hawks, Walsh and Siegel left.

It's an exercise in style, a triumph of a clever mind, a loveable barren film that adresses, from particular detail, general, eternal issues.

Those were The Driver's words after he take a crew of bank robbers for a test drive in their dodgy looking orange Mercedes and proceeds to trash it completely, knocking off both bumpers, tearing off a door, bumping both sides and flattening the roof. A classic scene and this is a good, late 70s action thriller from Walter Hill. It's film noir at it's best and it's pretty cool that every character doesn't have an actual name, we've got The Driver, The Detective, The Player and so on. Ryan O'Neal is cool without actually having to say very much and Bruce Dern is just Bruce Dern, wild eyed and crazy as the Detective determined to catch the Driver by using some strange policing. Isabelle Adjani is very quiet and a sexy foil for things to revolve around. The car chases and mash-ups are as good as some of the stuff used in Bullit, French Connection, The Seven-Ups and other top rate chase scenes.

Dern is a highlight as he is bonkers as ever and Walter Hill does a great job in direction and keeping things nice and compact.

Check it out!

There is no baloney in this surprisingly good movie (it's not well-known). It also sports a real oddity: no one's name is mentioned in the entire film! Try to think of any other film you've ever seen where this is the case.

Why 'The Driver" is not better known is a mystery since the director (Walter Hill) and main actors (Ryan O'Neal and Bruce Dern) are well-known entities.

Maybe because Ryan, who people think of more as the likable male in the immensely popular "Love Story," "Paper Moon" and "Barry Lyndon" plays against type, playing an ultra-serious criminal. Make no mistake: he does it well. He is a man of few words in this movie and he handles that in a fascinating manner. Dern is always interesting. Isabelle Adjani, more famous as a French actress, is nice to ogle and she, too, doesn't say much in this film.

The rest of the characters in this "neo noir" are a bunch of nasties, giving that edgy feel.

If you like film noir and particularly if you like car-chase scenes, well, this movie is must-have, because there are several intense chase scenes in here and they are long. They're also well-photographed, fun to watch and certainly keep your attention.

How underrated is Walter Hill?! 'The Driver' is one of his least known movies to a mainstream audience, but one of his best loved among fans. It's one of the greatest action movies I've ever seen, with car chases as exciting as any filmed before or since. The characters are all archetypes and named after their roles. There's no traditional character development here, but the actors and the action get the point across. Ryan O'Neal plays a getaway driver, the best in his field. Bruce Dern is the cop obsessed with catching him. He's willing to do anything to do so, even setting him up. I'm a major fan of Dern. I think he's one of the most interesting Hollywood actors and 'The Driver' is yet another great performance from him an a career filled with them ('The Wild Angels', 'Bloody Mama', 'Silent Running', 'Coming Home',etc.etc.) And Ryan O'Neal, an actor I've never warmed to, is surprisingly effective is a role originally intended for Steve McQueen. Plus you get Isabelle Adjani ('The Tenant'), always a pleasure to watch. I'd put 'The Driver' up there with the original versions of 'Vanishing Point', 'The Getaway' and 'Gone In 60 Seconds' as the most underrated action thrillers of the 1970s. Why it has yet to be remade is a mystery, but hoping it isn't as it will undoubtedly suck. Hollywood just seems to have lost the ability to make these kinds of movies. 'The Driver' is expertly directed by Walter Hill, who also scripted. Also check out 'The Warriors' and 'Southern Comfort' for the best of Hill. He's a hell of a film maker and rarely gets the attention he deserves.